


Where The Fields Are Painted Gold

by lady_ragnell



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Vacation, vineyards
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-12
Updated: 2018-08-12
Packaged: 2019-06-26 11:00:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,025
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15661884
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lady_ragnell/pseuds/lady_ragnell
Summary: Grantaire invites Enjolras to spend a week with him at a vineyard.





	Where The Fields Are Painted Gold

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gamefish](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gamefish/gifts).



> Written for fic for donations on tumblr, with thanks to **gamefish/piggybunny12** , who wanted Enjolras and Grantaire going on a vacation! I am counting it for my "road trip" square for trope bingo, because I think it counts.
> 
> Title from "Bloom" by The Paper Kites.

Paris has slowed to a summer crawl. It's a rainy night, but still hot enough to leave the windows open, and Enjolras is sitting by one with a book, hunched over the pages to keep raindrops from falling on them as he takes notes in the margins.

“It's August,” Grantaire says from the bed.

Last Enjolras knew, he was asleep, but he and Grantaire are both bad at falling asleep and staying asleep both, so it's not a surprise that he's awake now. “It hasn't just become August,” he points out. “It's been a few days.”

Grantaire yawns himself into sitting. “I know that, asshole. But I was thinking it's about time to get out of town for a week. Things are slow enough right now that I can pull it off.”

That pulls Enjolras up short, and he puts his book face down, spine stretched, to respond. “I didn't know you went on vacation.” There are a lot of things, after three years of sharing friends and three months of being together, that he doesn't know about Grantaire, but for some reason, this one startles him. Grantaire seems like an integral part of Paris, or maybe like it's an integral part of him. “Going home?”

“In a way, but not in the way you mean. Actually, this is my really subtle way of asking if you want to come.” He's mostly in the dark on the bed, only a little light from Enjolras's reading lamp falling on him, but Enjolras thinks he can hear the flinch in the way the sheets rustle. “You don't have to. Obviously.”

Enjolras probably would have dismissed the idea if Grantaire hadn't backpedaled, but he's starting to realize Grantaire will wheedle and tease all day about things that don't really matter to him, but he'll never push with things that do. “I haven't been out of the city since I moved here,” he says, giving Grantaire the chance to convince him, or comment.

“Of course you haven't. You're the very spirit of Paris. I shouldn't have mentioned it.”

Two deflections means it really is important. “What did you mean when you said that you were going home but not the way I meant?”

Grantaire hums, and the sheets rustle a little as he shifts. Enjolras turns away from the window, a stray breeze blowing some droplets against his back. “Oh, you know. As anyone who knows me knows, my soul's home must be among the vines in wine country, where like Dionysus or one of those rich wine assholes I wander all day, getting drunk off the smell of the air and talking a lot about hints of cinnamon and shit like that.”

“I don't know if Greek gods would have talked about hints of anything, in wine.” He's not talking about going to visit family, then. The only family he ever talks about is his mother's parents and occasionally, when he's very drunk, his father, and this doesn't feel like one of those times. This is a place. “So you want to go to wine country? Bordeaux?”

“The very place. Don't worry, I wouldn't make you do anything bourgeois like go to the beach in the south in August.”

Any other time, Enjolras would point out that he approves of France's use of vacation time in the summers, even if he doesn't like the crowded, too-hot beaches himself. Certainly not everyone has the resources to take advantage, but he approves in theory. This time, though, he's trying to understand something about Grantaire. That's more important than a late-night argument about politics. “Where do you go?”

“There's a vineyard with a cabin. I do some work for them, they give me the place cheap for a week. You don't have to work, you can just vacation. If you know how to do that.”

Enjolras tries not to bridle. “I'm not going to make you work without helping you.”

Grantaire laughs. “Sure, you can help me repair trellises and fix up their sad little website if you like, but cook dinner a night or two and we'll call it even.” He's still mostly in the dark, but the nod of his head might indicate Enjolras's book. “Catch up on some light reading.”

Enjolras is practicing his English by reading about economics in a book he stole from Combeferre, which Grantaire knows, but that's not the point either. “I think I can get away,” he says. “And I'll help as much as I can, though I've never fixed a trellis before. Or a website.”

“Only if you want to. Seriously, I didn't mean to put pressure on, nothing like that.”

“You just wanted to observe that it's August and ask me to wine country.” Enjolras is at sea, and he doesn't like it. “You aren't pressuring me, I was just confused, since I'd never known you went on vacation before.”

Grantaire hums, and the bedsprings creak when he lays back down, though he sounds more awake with every exchange. “Why would I tell you? I was ashamed of going off for a break when you spend the entire summer continuing to fight for justice and revolution.”

“Well, this year, I'm going with you. If you're serious about wanting me along.”

“Vacation sex,” Grantaire says, succinct where usually he'd take a few minutes to dance around the subject, and Enjolras doesn't think that's it, but he can pretend to believe it for now, especially when Grantaire punctuates that with a yawn. “Get some sleep, will you? I can feel your brain working over there.”

“I'll be back in bed as soon as I think I can fall asleep,” Enjolras promises, and Grantaire snorts, but doesn't say anything else.

Enjolras picks up his book, and wipes water droplets off the cover before he goes back to it.

*

They take the TGV to Bordeaux, and an old-fashioned train out to the country that feels like it's crawling after the speed of the first train, which Grantaire loved and Enjolras closed his eyes through because the scenery in his peripheral vision was blurring too much for him to read a book.

“How long have you been coming here?” he asks when they're getting close to their station, where Grantaire assures him that someone from the winery will be there to pick them up. It seems like a question he should have asked in the whirlwind week he's been planning to come on the trip, but he was busy rescheduling things and ducking curiosity from Courfeyrac and amused smiles from Lamarque, who was all too happy to give him the time off with claims that Enjolras works too much.

“Since I first moved to Paris,” Grantaire says. His head is tipped against the window while he looks at the scenery. “That first summer, Bahorel said he knew someone who knew someone who needed a few weeks of light work in exchange for room and board, and I've been back ever since.”

“I'm glad you're bringing me. Just a little surprised it never came up before.”

Grantaire shrugs, turning his hand over. Enjolras takes it automatically. “I don't know why it would have. We didn't tend to talk about vacation planning, or about our breaks.”

“We could have.”

“This feels like a weird guilt thing,” Grantaire says, sitting up straight and frowning, though he keeps hold of Enjolras's hand so it's probably not a very serious frown. “I don't know why, but you should quit it. We're going to have a great week, you're going to read five books and sunburn your nose and be very impressed with how sweaty I get while I'm digging holes for trellis posts. A truly pastoral and delightful sight, the very picture of a laborer returning from his—”

“Fine, fine,” says Enjolras. He's starting to learn when Grantaire is teasing out a hypothetical to make someone smile, and now that he realizes that's the motive, it's easier to find the monologues entertaining instead of distracting. “I wasn't feeling guilty. Just weird for not knowing something like that.”

“And I don't know the names of your childhood friends. If we knew everything at this stage of the game, things would be boring.”

That's easier to accept. And as much as Enjolras likes to know everything he can learn about his friends, collecting information like a magpie, he didn't learn until a few months ago that Courfeyrac hates white wine, and still isn't sure of Feuilly's roommate's name because she seems to have about three nicknames. “What's something you want to know about me, then?”

“I'll ask when I think of something good. For now, let's pack up, we're going to have to jump off the train in a few minutes.”

*

Enjolras doesn't know anything about vineyards, so he has to trust Grantaire when he says it's a fairly small one, a project for love more than for money by a family with other, more lucrative, sources of income. They're met at the train station by a middle-aged woman with sharp eyes and a fashionable bob that makes her look like a Parisienne, whose face softens when she sees Grantaire. He calls her Zephine, and she calls him by his first name while she chats away with him about people Enjolras doesn't know as she leads them to her car, insisting that Enjolras sits in the front and talking to Grantaire anyway.

It could be irritating, to be kindly ignored, but he appreciates her obvious affection for Grantaire, and the way Grantaire flirts with her outrageously the same way he does with every married or older woman Enjolras has ever seen with him with. He doesn't mind looking out the car window at the scenery, and the acres of trellises on a winding dirt road that it doesn't take them long to reach.

“Cabin's set up for two,” Zephine says when she stops at what Enjolras assumed was an equipment shed half a kilometer from what must be her house. “Let us know if you need supplies from town, and you've got today before we put you to work.” She turns to Enjolras and her smile gets a little warmer. “Him, anyway. He's said you're his guest.”

“I don't know what I'm doing, but I'm happy to work.”

“Don't listen to him, disaster follows whenever he attempts carpentry.”

Enjolras would object, but Grantaire was part of the crew that helped with the renovations at the family shelter a year ago, where Enjolras was eventually relegated to handing Feuilly whatever tools he needed at a given moment. “I can pick grapes,” he offers.

Both of them stare at him in horror, which probably means grapes aren't in season yet. “I'll just take him inside and report in as usual,” Grantaire says after a moment. “Thanks for picking us up.”

“I'm glad you have company this year,” she replies, and then she's back in the car, giving them a brief wave, and Enjolras turns his attention to getting their bags inside.

“I'm going to hate letting you work all week without doing some myself,” he says once they're inside. The cabin is bare bones, but there's electricity, and a bed, and a woodstove for heat that he thinks must double as a stove. “I'll rephrase: I'm not going to let you do all the work without letting me help.”

Grantaire gives him a dubious look that dissolves into a smile. “I know that. We'll find you something useful to do that won't lead to you or the grapevines getting injured.”

Enjolras decides against really unpacking anything and flops on the bed instead. It's been so long since he left Paris that he'd forgotten how tiring a day's travel can be, and there's still plenty of daylight left. He sifts through all the new things he's learned since getting off the train and lets himself be selfish and seize on one of them. “I'm the first person you've brought along?”

“Who else would I have brought?” Grantaire asks, sounding baffled.

“A friend of ours, maybe. Or Irma—you were dating her over a summer, weren't you? And it was serious?”

Grantaire laughs in a way that makes Enjolras wince and regret asking. “Irma Boissy was never serious about me, and would never be caught dead spending a week at a country winery. And as for our friends, this cabin is very small, and so is the only bed.”

This is a vacation, not an interrogation, and Enjolras is not going to let his curiosity upset Grantaire. “How small?” he asks, and lets his smile grow.

“You're the one on it.”

“I think we'll be able to tell much easier if we're both on the bed. For comparison.”

This time, Grantaire's laugh is warm, the real one that's rare except when their friends are around, and within seconds he's with Enjolras on the bed, and by the time they get up again, the sun is setting and Enjolras has to admit that he has no idea how to cook dinner on a woodstove.

“I'm decent at it and you'll figure it out in no time,” says Grantaire, and pulls him over to make him help.

*

Enjolras wakes to a beautiful morning and Grantaire already cooking breakfast. “I thought I was supposed to cook this week,” he says. “Since you're the one working for our room and board.”

“I was not heartless enough to wake you up when you're sleeping like an angel, but you can feel free to cook later. They tend to sleep late at the main house. Want the tour, since we spent all day in bed yesterday?”

“Breakfast and a tour sounds good, and I'll cook something for later.” Enjolras likes cooking, if he can find the time, and he's a little more confident on the woodstove after last night. “Today's that call for Lamarque that I couldn't get out of, too.”

“Afternoon, right?” Enjolras nods. “No worries, then, I'll be busy by then, you'll have privacy to talk if you can get the reception for it.”

“I'm fine so far,” says Enjolras, and rolls out of bed. He and Grantaire don't live together, with everything so new, but they've spent enough nights together at this point to have a morning routine, even if it's changed by a tiny cabin with an even tinier bathroom. He can move on autopilot through washing his face and brushing his teeth, responding to Grantaire's intermittent commentary about the morning news as he reads it off his phone while he cooks, and then take over the eggs because Grantaire always gets impatient and undercooks them.

The news carries them through breakfast, and Enjolras puts the dishes in the sink to soak and looks expectantly at Grantaire, who laughs and stands up from the table. “Fine, fine, they'll be expecting me soon anyway, so I'll take you around and see if I can guess where I'll be working this week.”

It's going to be a hot day, but for now, there's still dew on the grass as they walk out in the direction of the rows and rows of grapevines.

Enjolras hasn't ever thought about vineyards, not really. They're part of life in France, and thus he cares about them in the abstract, but he hasn't been involved in any strikes from farmworkers, and he didn't live near any as a child. There's a certain amount of academic interest, he discovers, in seeing something new to him.

It smells different than he would have imagined, he discovers when they get to the fields. He'd expected it to smell acrid, or like wine or grape juice, but instead it mostly smells like lavender, because there are blooming rows of it planted by the trellises.

It's also more orderly than he expects, he discovers as Grantaire leads him down one of the rows. It's a fairly small field of vines, as they go, as far as Enjolras can tell, but it's a good size for a family operation, and he wonders idly about logistics even as he's surprised by the sturdy metal and wood constructions of the trellises, straight instead of sinuous, with the vines encouraged along those lines too. “How does it all work?” he asks.

“Well, there's this scientific process called photosynthesis that I'm sure Combeferre could—”

“Grantaire.”

Grantaire just grins at him, relaxed in ways Enjolras is only starting to get used to. “You think I know? I'm only ever here at one time of year, and only allowed to do repairs and website shit. I'm not exactly planting and pruning and harvesting, and alas, no one has ever called upon me to stomp grapes in the manner of my forebears, or do whatever people do to make wine in the twenty-first century that is not nearly as fun as walking on fruit. I fix trellises, help them get rid of pests, update their website, and taste a few things out of their cellar. Just enjoy the scenery and be impressed with me, please.”

“It's hard to be impressed with you when you've just said that you know nothing about the operation,” says Enjolras, and finds that he's lying. Grantaire might not have the expertise, but he loves this place and Enjolras is still endlessly fascinated by discovering the things Grantaire loves.

“I meant be impressed with me as part of the scenery, keep up.”

Grantaire seems more amused than stung, but Enjolras makes a point of grabbing his hand as they walk anyway. If he says he was teasing, Grantaire will just tease him right back. He's getting better at picking his battles. “It's beautiful scenery,” he says instead. “I'm not good at stopping to appreciate that, but it is lovely.”

“Good. Get some relaxing in. Then maybe I can tempt you into sloth more often.”

“Hoping to make this an annual tradition?” Enjolras asks, and only realizes what he's implying once it's said. He doesn't try to explain it away, though. As uncomfortable as Grantaire sometimes seems with mentions of their future, Enjolras still likes to try.

This time, Grantaire doesn't look uncomfortable. A little surprised, maybe, but then a smile spreads across his face and he changes his grip so he's holding Enjolras's hand a little more tightly. “Come on, I think I see some rotted posts ahead, let's go see.”

*

Enjolras hasn't taken what he considers to be a vacation in a long time, and he expects to be fidgeting and ready to go home after a day, especially with Grantaire busy at work and continuing to insist that he doesn't need Enjolras's help.

On the first day, he spends more time than he'd like to admit texting with Courfeyrac and Feuilly about their latest project and makes a call for Lamarque, but he also makes dinner on the woodstove, so that might count as something like a vacation, especially when Grantaire comes back sunburned and cheerful and eats dinner like he's starving before tumbling Enjolras into bed.

The next day, he wakes alone in bed with a text telling him that Grantaire is going to do most of his work before the day gets too hot, and that he should sleep in. He texts back telling him that he'll do no such thing and that Grantaire needs to wake him up to make breakfast, and then he gets dressed and goes for a walk.

He thinks, somewhere in the distance, that he can hear Grantaire laughing, calling questions and instructions to someone else whose voice doesn't recognize, but he doesn't go that way. Grantaire is working, and as much as Enjolras likes watching him do things he's good at and enjoys, he also knows that he's a distraction.

The trellises are just tall enough that he's surprised to run into Zephine going around from one row to another. “I thought I'd go for a walk,” he offers, and feels stupid saying it.

She eyes him, and then, to his surprise, smiles a little. “I'm putting up some measures against birds, now that the grapes are getting close to ripe. They've been netted for a while, but the closer they get, the more determined the birds are.”

“Do you want help?”

“I've been told you can't do carpentry. Let's see how you do with reflective tape.”

Reflective tape, it turns out, is fairly easy to apply to trellis posts, and Enjolras absorbs himself in the easy work and lack of conversation until he's interrupted by Grantaire's voice some time later, when it's hot enough that he's wondering whether shedding his shirt would mean being cooler or getting sunburned.

“Here I thought you were going to spend the week ogling me while I did manual labor. I can't say I mind the reverse, though,” Grantaire says, and Enjolras straightens with a smile.

“This doesn't have quite the same appeal, but I'm flattered anyway,” he says. “I decided to try to help instead of just reading the week away.”

“You underestimate the sight of you sweating in the sunshine.” He slings an arm around Enjolras, and he smells like sweat and dirt, which would normally have Enjolras shrugging him off, but he probably doesn't smell much better. Down the row, where Zephine is finishing up, doing a faster and neater job than Enjolras, there's a snort, but she also doesn't tell them to stop. “I'm a little sad you didn't come to see me sweating at my labors, though.”

“There's the rest of the week for that.”

“Promises, promises.”

Zephine approaches, empty basket of bird deterrents in hand. “Lunch up at the house today, gentlemen.”

“Website work this afternoon?” Grantaire asks, already steering Enjolras in the direction they want to go.

She shrugs. “There's no hurry on that.”

She walks off ahead of them, which makes it easier to hide his grin as he and Grantaire fall in behind her, walking awkwardly for a few steps before Enjolras shrugs Grantaire's arm off his shoulders to take his hand instead. Zephine is obviously fond of Grantaire, and happy to let him have vacation as much as he's working, and Enjolras likes her all the more for it.

Inside the house, it's bustling, another five people Enjolras hasn't met yet inside, from a woman Zephine's age who gives Grantaire the sharp edge of her tongue and beams the whole time to a boy of about fifteen who seems to be some kind of nephew. They've walked into the middle of some kind of debate about football that Enjolras can't follow, but he listens, bemused, as Grantaire is immediately dragged into the argument, playing both sides as deftly as he ever does in meetings.

Enjolras stays quiet. With new people, he'd always rather listen than talk, and this is another side of Grantaire that he likes seeing on top of it. He's benignly ignored in the way he remembers being when Courfeyrac's parents came to town and were coerced into bringing their son's best friends out to dinner, and likes it now in ways he didn't like it then.

When lunch is over, he offers to do the dishes, and everyone else but Grantaire scatters. “If you're going to tell me not to work, I'm not going to listen,” Enjolras warns him when they're mostly on their own, after a scattering of excuses from everyone else about going to town, checking in with work, calling up friends.

“Oh no, I'm not going to scold you. I suppose the thought of supporting you for the week while you lazed around was a distant dream at best.”

Enjolras considers that. “I'm not sure I know how to laze around. I'm not going to build trellises, but I can do dishes. Do they meet at the house for lunch every day?”

“Most days. Depends on who's in town. It's kind of a loose family, I don't think it's ever been the same combination of people when I've been here. Zephine's always here, and Favourite almost always, but the rest come and go.”

“Like you.”

“And who knows? Maybe you too.”

Enjolras thinks about that for the rest of the time it takes him to do the dishes with Grantaire there distracting him. He thinks a little about the family Grantaire doesn't mention, and a little about how quiet his voice got on those last few words, and when he finishes, he grabs Grantaire's sleeve and offers to go back to the cabin.

*

Enjolras had forgotten what time outside the city is like. Everything stretches, especially on long summer days. Meals and tasks and lazy afternoons seem endless, and when it rains one morning and he and Grantaire huddle under blankets to protect themselves from a leak, laughing and exchanging secrets like children at a sleepover, it seems like it lasts forever.

After the hurry of Paris, it's strange to feel like there are so many hours in the day. He runs out of books, because even if he insists on working, he's nowhere near as useful as Grantaire and mostly has to give in and go back to the shed or take his book out to one of the fields to read and shoo away any brave birds.

It's not a vacation on the beach, sun and sand and the endless blue he remembers from his childhood, but it's better. Even if Enjolras didn't love it for himself, he would love it for Grantaire's sake. There are few things that make him honestly happy, without a shade of bitterness or mockery: his friends, walks around Paris, and now here.

He likes the way Grantaire seems more relaxed, not just on his own, but with Enjolras, like there's something easier about the two of them when they're on vacation. He wants to ask if there's a way to make Grantaire this comfortable in their relationship all the time, but he knows that's a sure way of making him self-conscious. Instead, he tempts him into bed as often as he can, and lets the hours stretch out.

*

Their last full day there, Zephine gives Grantaire the day and tells them both to come to the house for lunch but not to work besides that, and Enjolras and Grantaire spend the morning walking the property, well past where the vineyard is and into the fields that were cut earlier in the summer for hay, out to the trees beyond those, a thin line to mark the edge of the property.

“Would you want to do this someday?” Enjolras asks, without quite meaning to. “Run a vineyard?”

Grantaire gives him a puzzled look, looking up from his inspection of an old stone wall that needs some maintenance. Perhaps a project for next year. Enjolras thinks he could probably help with that. Moving rocks seems less difficult than putting together trellises. “Thinking of giving up Paris for the idyllic pastoral life?”

“No. But you seem happy here.”

“Enjolras.” Grantaire elbows him gently in the side. “I love this place, and these people, but it's a vacation. Of course I'm happy, but I doubt I would be if I had to do it day in and day out. I'm happy because I'm with you.”

“I'm happy here too,” Enjolras says, in case Grantaire needs the reassurance. “I'd be happy to come back next year.”

Maybe it's stupid, to be planning a year in advance. He and Grantaire are still new, and Grantaire still seems unsure in their relationship. The vacation has gone well, or at least it has for Enjolras, but he might not want to think a year ahead.

When he glances to the side, gauging Grantaire's reaction, his worries are erased. Grantaire isn't smiling with dazed pleasure like he did after Enjolras first kissed him and at their first five dates. He's not unsure, like he still is all too often. Instead, he's smiling just like he has been all week, like everything is easy and uncomplicated, maybe even them. “Zephine will put you to work then, I'm pretty sure you only get one year as a guest,” he says, but his smile never falters.

“I'll have to improve my carpentry skills, then,” Enjolras replies, pleased, and lets Grantaire feign horror for the next five minutes without minding. Grantaire will teach him anyway. He's suddenly certain of that.

*

Zephine drives them to the train station in the morning, mostly quiet but checking to make sure neither of them has forgotten anything in her shed and then turning on the radio, some unfamiliar presenter talking about a book Enjolras hasn't read.

“He says you cook,” she says when they're getting out of the car, collecting their bags.

Enjolras raises his eyebrows. “I do. He's pretty good as well, but I like it more.”

She nods, with a thin smile. “That will be a start for next year, then.”

Enjolras grins, and she rolls her eyes and shoos them into the train station to wait. Both of them are tired, Grantaire leaning his head on Enjolras's shoulder as they wait, and when they get on the train, Grantaire nods off and will probably have to be woken when the time comes to switch to the TGV in Bordeaux. Enjolras lets him sleep.

It's been a long time since he what he'd call a vacation, but he remembers being a child on his way back from the beach, feeling like he was putting on layers of himself again after forgetting about them for a few days, remembering life outside the vacation and being weighed down by it again. To some extent, he has to do it again this time, drag his mind away from long lazy days and back to the fast pace of Paris, but it doesn't feel like he's accepting a weight that he doesn't want. Maybe it's because this time, the best part of the vacation is still with him. Whatever's changed with Grantaire, whatever has had him smiling this week, secure in a way he wasn't before, Enjolras thinks it will stay.

Next to him, Grantaire lets out a quiet snore. Enjolras smiles, and takes out his phone, and starts looking up all the information he can find about the care and keeping of grapevines.


End file.
